UPMC Health Plan, Early: Media Collective and Stage AE are pleased to announce that BodyRock! 2020 has become a free virtual fitness event. The event is designed to deliver the best of Pittsburgh’s fitness scene to an active audience all from the comfort of their own homes. Presented by UPMC Health Plan, BodyRock! will bring hundreds of fitness enthusiasts from across the Pittsburgh region, and beyond, together in a format that is becoming the new normal. Once registered you have access to free online cutting-edge workouts taught by Pittsburgh’s top-rated boutique fitness instructors.
We caught up with Laura Early (electronically of course) for a quick Q & A.
LOCALpgh-How many years have you been operating Body Rock? Laura Early- I can’t even believe it, but this is our 5th annual event!
LOCALpgh- What was the inspiration for putting this together? Laura Early- The inspiration came from my passion for working out and the explosion of boutique fitness. Pittsburgh’s fitness scene continues to impress me every year with its growth of new studios and instructors. It is bittersweet to make this pivot this year, however, my passion to share movement with my community has me eager to bring this year’s event virtual.
LOCALpgh- Obviously with the current situation you had to pivot and make major changes, can you explain how this year’s virtual program will work? Laura Early- Individuals can pre-register at bodyrockpgh.com. Then on Sunday, April 19th at 8am the website will go fully live. We will be offering 16 classes from 12 local studios. Participants can also go to Stage AE’s Instagram to take part in a 9:30 boxing class with Coach JB from Shape Training sponsored by TRULY and a dance class with Kam Jamz at 11am. All classes are free! And the website will be live for 30 days for people to access.
LOCALpgh- What were the logistics of putting this together like? Laura Early- Challenging, inspiring and a ton of work! Special thanks to UPMC Health Plan sponsoring the virtual event allowed us the opportunity to take additional time to build out a fully operational website and Vimeo station. Local studios then provided us with either pre-recorded content or content that was unique to this year’s event! TRULY also is supporting the event and most specifically the boxing class. Thanks to those two partners for helping to financially pull this all together. Also since this is free we are asking people to donate to Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater PGH
LOCALpgh- Where does your mix of instructors come from?
Laura Early- In addition to our hand-curated list of instructors for 2020 we have invited back all of our OG instructors to offer even more opportunities to sweat it out. We take the time to preview and select the best of the best and we can’t wait to share with our city. New to this year’s multi-faceted line-up are April Jackson and Kristen Boyer of Mt. Lebanon’s – and soon to be Strip District’s – Mecka Fitness. April and Kristen will lead a mixed-format workout of bodyweight strength training and yoga. Returning again this year to the BodyRock! stage are Kam Jamz, Nick Staples of Zenergy, SWEAT PGH and our previous years’ studios including Steel Revolution and Pure Barre.
LOCALpgh- I believe there is a charitable aspect to this event can you explain? Laura Early- Yes, BodyRock! 2020 has included a significant charitable component to the mix. We will be asking individuals to donate to Big Brothers Big Sisters rather than purchasing tickets to this years event. Donation links will be available via our online platform. 100% of the proceeds will be benefiting Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) of Greater Pittsburgh and will help to fund the BBBS “Bigs and Littles” youth mentoring programs.
The website bodyrockpgh.com will go live at 8am and will provide individuals with access to classes, meditations and health discussions. The site will remain live indefinitely for those individuals unable to log on next Sunday. All-access tickets are free and individuals can pre-register here.
